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diff --git a/30016-8.txt b/30016-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6e30cee --- /dev/null +++ b/30016-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2202 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Medical Investigation in Seventeenth +Century England, by Charles W. Bodemer and Lester S. King + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Medical Investigation in Seventeenth Century England + Papers Read at a Clark Library Seminar, October 14, 1967 + +Author: Charles W. Bodemer + Lester S. King + +Release Date: September 18, 2009 [EBook #30016] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEDICAL INVESTG'N--17THCENT ENGLAND *** + + + + +Produced by Gerard Arthus, Stephanie Eason, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net. + + + + + + + + + + Medical Investigation + in Seventeenth Century + England + + Charles W. Bodemer + + Lester S. King + + William Andrews Clark Memorial Library + + + + Medical Investigation + in Seventeenth Century + England + + Embryological Thought in + Seventeenth Century England + + _by Charles W. Bodemer_ + + Robert Boyle as an Amateur Physician + + _by Lester S. King_ + + Papers Read at a Clark Library Seminar, + October 14, 1967 + + William Andrews Clark Memorial Library + _University of California, Los Angeles/1968_ + + + + +_Foreword_ + + +Although the collection of scientific literature in the Clark Library +has already served as the background for a number of seminars, in the +most recent of them the literature of embryology and the medical aspects +of Robert Boyle's thought were subjected to a first and expert +examination. Charles W. Bodemer, of the Division of Biomedical History, +School of Medicine, University of Washington, evaluated the +embryological ideas of that remarkable group of inquiring Englishmen, +Sir Kenelm Digby, Nathaniel Highmore, William Harvey, and Sir Thomas +Browne. Lester S. King, Senior Editor of the _Journal of the American +Medical Association_, dealt with the medical side of Robert Boyle's +writings, the collection of which constitutes one of the chief glories +of the Clark Library. It was a happy marriage of subject matter and +library's wealth, the former a noteworthy oral presentation, the latter +a spectacular exhibit. As usual, and of necessity, the audience was +restricted in size, far smaller in numbers than all those who are now +able to enjoy the presentations in their present, printed form. + +C. D. O'MALLEY + +_Professor of Medical History, UCLA_ + + + + +I + +_Embryological Thought in Seventeenth +Century England_ + +CHARLES W. BODEMER + + +To discuss embryological thought in seventeenth-century England is to +discuss the main currents in embryological thought at a time when those +currents were both numerous and shifting. Like every other period, the +seventeenth century was one of transition. It was an era of explosive +growth in scientific ideas and techniques, suffused with a creative urge +engendered by new philosophical insights and the excitement of +discovery. During the seventeenth century, the ideas relating to the +generation and development of organisms were quite diverse, and there +were seldom criteria other than enthusiasm or philosophical predilection +to distinguish the fanciful from the feasible. Applying a well-known +phrase from another time to seventeenth-century embryological theory, +"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of +wisdom, it was the age of foolishness."[1] + +Embryology underwent some very significant changes during the +seventeenth century. At the beginning of the century, embryology was +descriptive and clearly directed toward morphological goals; by the end +of the century, a dynamic, more physiological attitude was apparent, and +theories of development derived from an entirely different philosophic +base. During this time, English investigators contributed much, some of +ephemeral, some of lasting importance to the development of embryology. +For this discussion, we will divide the seventeenth century into three +overlapping, but generally distinct, periods; and, without pretence of +presenting an exhaustive exposition, we will concentrate upon the +concepts and directions of change characteristic of each period, with +primary reference to those individuals who best reveal the character of +seventeenth-century English embryology. + +An understanding of the characteristics of embryological thought at the +beginning of the seventeenth century may enhance appreciation of later +developments. During the latter part of the sixteenth century, the study +of embryology was, for obvious reasons, most often considered within the +province of anatomy and obstetrics. From Bergengario da Capri to Jean +Riolan the Younger, study of the fetus was recommended as an adjunct of +these subjects, and it required investigation by direct observation, as +decreed by the "restorers" of anatomy. Embryonic development was, +however, also studied independently of other disciplines by a smaller +group of individuals, and the study of chick development by Aldrovandus, +Coiter, and Fabricius ab Aquapendente laid the basic groundwork of +descriptive embryology. In either case, during the last half of the +sixteenth century the attempt of the embryologist to break with the +traditions of the past was overt, although consistently unsuccessful. +When dealing with the fetus, the investigators of this period were, +almost to a man, Galenists influenced to varying degrees by Hippocrates, +Aristotle, and Avicenna. Each felt compelled to challenge the immediate +authority, and yet their intellectual isolation from the past was +incomplete, and their views on embryogeny corresponded with more often +than they differed from those of the person they railed against. + +Embryology emerged as a distinct scientific discipline during the last +half of the sixteenth century and early years of the seventeenth century +as a result of the aforementioned investigations of Aldrovandus, Coiter, +and Fabricius. Concerned with description and depiction of the anatomy +of the embryo, they established a period of macro-iconography in +embryology. The macro-iconographic era was empirical and based upon +first-hand observation; it was concerned more with the facts than with +the theories of development. This empiricism existed in competition with +a declining, richly vitalistic Aristotelian rationalism which had +virtually eliminated empiricism during the scholastic period. However, +the decline of this vitalistic rationalism coincided with the rise of a +mechanistic rationalism which had its roots in ancient Greek atomistic +theories of matter. The empiricism comprising the _leitmotif_ of the +macro-iconographic movement then became blended with, or, more often, +submerged within, the new variety of rationalism; hence, mechanistic +rationalism, divorced entirely or virtually from empiricism, +characterizes embryology during the first half of the seventeenth +century. It is a particularly vigorous strain of seventeenth-century +English embryological thought, well illustrated in the writings of that +English man of affairs, Sir Kenelm Digby. + +Digby, whose name, according to one biographer, "is almost synonymous +with genius and eccentricity,"[2] could claim our attention not only as +a scientist of talent, but also as a statesman, soldier, pirate, lover, +and a Roman Catholic possessed of sufficient piety and naked courage to +attempt the conversion of Oliver Cromwell. Like his father, who was +hanged for participation in the Gunpowder Plot, Digby was a political +creature, and during the Civil War he was imprisoned for several years. +When freed, Digby left England to settle in France. Spending much time +at the court of the Queen Dowager, who had been instrumental in securing +his release, and exposed to the vigorous intellectual currents of Paris +and Montpellier, Digby labored upon a treatise of greater scientific +substance and merit than his more famous work on "the powder of +sympathy." Published in 1644 under the title _Two Treatises, in the One +of Which, The Nature of Bodies; in the Other, the Nature of Mans Soule; +is Looked_ _into, in Way of Discovery of the Immortality of Reasonable +Soules_, the book consists of a highly individual survey of the entire +realms of metaphysics, physics, and biology. + +Digby's cannons were aimed at scholasticism, which, despite "greatly +exaggerated" reports, did not die with the Middle Ages. The spirit of +scholasticism was alive in many quarters well into the seventeenth +century, and although many scholars worked in pursuit of original +knowledge, they did not always disturb the scholastic philosophic basis +from which their work derived. For example, in his impressive _De +formato foetu_, published in 1604, when Sir Kenelm Digby was one year +old, Fabricius all too often submerges a substantial body of +observations within a dense tangle of philosophical discussion. Thus, in +the same treatise that contains the first illustrations and commendably +accurate descriptions of the daily progress of the chick's development, +Fabricius devotes an inordinate amount of space to tedious discussions +of material and efficient causes in development, emphasizing thereby the +supremacy of the logical framework to the observations. In 1620, Digby's +last year of study at Oxford University, Fienus published a work, _De +Formatrice Foetus_, designed to demonstrate that the human embryo +receives the rational soul on the third day after conception and to +discuss at length such subjects as the efficient cause of embryogeny and +the proposition that the conformation of the fetus is a vital, not a +natural, action. Various expressions of Aristotelian and scholastic +biology were clearly abroad during the first half of the seventeenth +century, and there is reason, then, for Digby's attack upon Aristotelian +ideas of form and matter and of the persistence of "qualities" in +physics and "faculties" in biology. + +Expressing his disdain of word-spinning, Digby attempts to explain all +phenomena by two "virtues" only, rarity and density working by local +motion. In discussing embryonic development, Digby writes, "...our +maine question shall be, Whether they be framed entirely at once; or +successively, one part after another? And, if this later way, which +part first?"[3] Toward this end, Digby makes some direct observations +upon the development of the chick embryo, incubating the eggs so that +the "creatures ... might be continually in our power to observe in them +the course of nature every day and houre."[4] His description of chick +development is of epigenetic bent: + + ...you may lay severall egges to hatch; and by breaking them at + severall ages you may distinctly observe every hourely mutation in + them, if you please. The first will bee, that on one side you shall + find a great resplendent clearnesse in the white. After a while, a + little spott of red matter like bload, will appeare in the middest + of that clearnesse fastened to the yolke: which will have a motion + of opening and shutting; so as sometimes you will see it, and + straight againe it will vanish from your sight; and indeede att the + first it is so litle, that you can not see it, but by the motion of + it; for att every pulse, as it openeth, you may see it, and + immediately againe, it shutteth in such sort, as it is not to be + discerned. From this red specke, after a while there will streame + out, a number of litle (almost imperceptible) red veines. Att the + end of some of which, in time there will be gathered together, a + knotte of matter which by litle and litle, will take the forme of a + head; and you will ere long beginne to discerne eyes and a beake in + it. All this while the first red spott of blood, groweth bigger and + solider; till att the length, it becometh a fleshy substance; and + by its figure, may easily be discerned to be the hart: which as yet + hath no other enclosure but the substance of the egge. But by litle + and litle the rest of the body of an animal is framed out of those + red veines which streame out all aboute from the hart. And in + processe of time, that body incloseth the hart within it by the + chest, which groweth over on both sides, and in the end meeteth, + and closeth it selfe fast together. After which this litle creature + soone filleth the shell, by converting into severall partes of it + selfe all the substance of the egge. And then growing weary of so + straight an habitation, it breaketh prison, and cometh out, a + perfectly formed chicken.[5] + + +Despite this observational effort, Digby's experience with the embryo is +quite limited, and his theory of development relates more to his +philosophical stance than to the facts of development. Indeed, the +theory he propounds is not necessarily consistent. On the one hand, it +posits a strictly mechanistic epigenesis, and on the other hand, it +incorporates the notion of "specificall vertues drawne by the bloud in +its iterated courses, by its circular motion, through all the severall +partes of the parents body."[6] Digby rejects an internal agent, +entelechy, or the Aristotelian formal and efficient causes. Similarly, +he disposes of the idea that the embryonic parts derive from some part +of each part of the parent's body or an assemblage of parts. This +possibility is eliminated, he contends, by the occurrence of spontaneous +generation. If a collection of parts was necessary, he asks, "how could +vermine breed out of living bodies, or out of corruption?... How could +froggs be ingendered in the ayre?"[7] Generation in plants and animals +must, then, according to Digby, proceed from the action of an external +agent, effecting the proper mingling of the rare and dense bodies with +one another, upon a homogeneous substance and converting it into an +increasingly heterogeneous substance. "Generation," he says, + + is not made by aggregation of like partes to presupposed like ones: + nor by a specificall worker within; but by the compounding of a + seminary matter, with the juice which accreweth to it from without, + and with the streames of circumstant bodies; which by an ordinary + course of nature, are regularly imbibed in it by degrees; and which + att every degree do change it into a different thing.[8] + +Digby argues that the animal is made of the juices that later nourish +it, that the embryo is generated from superfluous nourishment coming +from all parts of the parent body and containing "after some sort, the +perfection of the whole living creature."[9] Then, through digestion and +other degrees of heat and moisture, the superfluous nourishment becomes +an homogeneous body, which is then changed by successive transformations +into an animal. + +Digby is frankly deterministic in his description of embryonic +development: + + Take a beane, or any other seede, and putt it into the earth, and + lett water fall upon it; can it then choose but that the beane must + swell? The beane swelling, can it choose but breake the skinne? The + skinne broken can it choose (by reason of the heate that is in it) + but push out more matter, and do that action which we may call + germinating.... Now if all this orderly succession of mutations be + necessarily made in a beane, by force of sundry circumstances and + externall accidents; why may it not be conceived that the like is + also done in sensible creatures; but in a more perfect manner.... + Surely the progresse we have sett downe is much more reasonable, + then to conceive that in the meale of the beane, are contained in + litle, severall similar substances.... Or, that in the seede of the + male, there is already in act, the substance of flesh, of bone, of + sinewes, of veines, and the rest of those severall similar partes + which are found in the body of an animall; and that they are but + extended to their due magnitude, by the humidity drawne from the + mother, without receiving any substantiall mutation from what they + were originally in the seede. Lett us then confidently conclude, + that all generation is made of a fitting, but remote, homogeneall + compounded substance: upon which, outward Agents working in the due + course of nature, do change it into an other substance, quite + different from the first, and do make it lesse homogeneall then the + first was. And other circumstances and agents, do change this + second into a thirde; that thirde, into a fourth; and so onwardes, + by successive mutations (that still make every new thing become + lesse homogeneall, then the former was, according to the nature of + heate, mingling more and more different bodies together) untill + that substance be produced, which we consider in the periode of all + these mutations....[10] + + +Digby thus makes a good statement of epigenetic development. He +attempts, without success, a physiochemical explanation of the +mechanisms of development, finally admitting: + + I persuade my selfe it appeareth evident enough, that to effect + this worke of generation, there needeth not be supposed a forming + vertue ... of an unknowne power and operation.... Yet, in + discourse, for conveniency and shortnesse of expression we shall + not quite banish that terme from all commerce with us; so that what + we meane by it, be rightly understood; which is, the complexe, + assemblement, or chayne of all the causes, that concurre to produce + this effect; as they are sett on foote, to this end by the great + Architect and Moderatour of them, God Almighty, whose instrument + Nature is.[11] + +Digby's general theory thus represents a strange mixture of epigenesis +and pangenesis, and is not entirely devoid of "virtues." It is, however, +a bold attempt to explain embryonic development in terms commensurate +with his time, and it embodies the same optimistic belief that the +mechanism of embryogenesis lay accessible to man's reason and logical +faculties that similarly led Descartes and Gassendi to comprehensive +interpretations of embryonic development comprising a maximum of logic +and minimum of observations. + +The traditionalist reaction to the attack upon treasured and +intellectually comfortable interpretations of development was not slow +to set in. A year after the appearance of Digby's _Nature of Bodies_, +Alexander Ross published a treatise with a title indicating its goals +and content: _The Philosophicall Touch-Stone; or Observations upon Sir +Kenelm Digbie's Discourses of the nature of Bodies, and of the +reasonable Soule: In which his erroneous Paradoxes are refuted, the +Truth, and Aristotelian Philosophy vindicated, the immortality of mans +Soule briefly, but sufficiently proved_.[12] Ross supports the Galenist +tradition that the liver, not, as Digby claimed, the heart, forms first +in development. It can be no other way, he says, since the blood is the +source of nourishment and the liver is necessary for formation of the +blood. Furthermore, he contends, "the seed is no part of the ... aliment +of the body ... the seed is the quintessence of the blood."[13] Ross is +an epigeneticist, to be sure, but so was Aristotle, and Ross prefers to +maintain the supremacy of logic and the concepts of the Aristotelian +tradition as a guide to the interpretation of development. + +In 1651, Nathaniel Highmore, a physician at Sherborne in Dorset, +published _The History of Generation_, which, he informs us, is an +answer to the opinions expressed by Digby in _The Nature of Bodies_. +Highmore's book is an important one in the history of embryology, since +it is the first treatment of embryogeny from the atomistic viewpoint and +because it contains the first published observations based upon +microscopic examination of the chick blastoderm. Admittedly, the +drawings illustrating Highmore's observations upon generation are, to +use a word often applied to modern art, "interesting," but they do +derive from actual observations of developing plant and animal embryos. +His observations on the developing chick embryo are quite full, +complete, and exact, and he also records some interesting facts +regarding development of plant seeds. + +Highmore's theory of development appears to have emerged directly out of +his observations of development. In this sense, his theory rests upon a +more solid base than does the developmental theory of Digby. His theory +is a mixture of vitalism and atomism, designed to eliminate the "fortune +and chance"[14] resident in Digby's concept. "Generation," he says, + + ...is performed by parts selected from the generators, retaining + in them the substance, forms, properties, and operations of the + parts of the generators, from whence they were extracted: and this + Quintessence or Magistery is called the seed. By which the + Individuals of every Species are multiplied... + + +From this, All Creatures take their beginning; some laying up the like +matter, for further procreation of the same Species. + +In others, some diffus'd Atomes of this extract, shrinking themselves +into some retired parts of the Matter; become as it were lost, in a +wilderness of other confused seeds; and there sleep, till by a +discerning corruption they are set at liberty, to execute their own +functions. Hence it is, that so many swarms of living Creatures are from +the corruption of others brought forth: From our own flesh, from other +Animals, from Wood, nay, from everything putrified, these imprisoned +seminal principles are muster'd forth, and oftentimes having obtained +their freedom, by a kinde of revenge feed on their prison; and devour +that which preserv'd them from being scatter'd.[15] Accounting thus for +sexual and spontaneous generation, Highmore defines two types of seminal +atoms in the seed--"Material Atomes, animated and directed by a +spiritual form, proper to that species whose the seed is; and given to +such matter at the creation to distinguish it from other matters, and to +make it such a Creature as it is."[16] The seminal atoms come from all +parts of the body, the spiritual atoms from the male, and the material +atoms from the female. The atoms of Democritus are thus transmuted into +the "substantial forms" and endowed either with the efficient cause of +Aristotle or, permitted to remain material, with Aristotle's material +cause. According to Highmore, the atoms are circulated in the blood, +which is a "tincture extracted from those things we eat," and these +various atoms retain their formal identity despite corruption. The +testicles abstract some spiritual atoms belonging to each part and, "As +the parts belonging to every particle of the Eye, the Ear, the Heart, +the Liver, etc. which should in nutrition, have been added ... to every +one of these parts, are compendiously, and exactly extracted from the +blood, passing through the body of the Testicles." Being here "cohobated +and reposited in a tenacious matter," the particles finally pass out of +the testes.[17] A similar extraction of the female seed occurs in the +ovaries. The female seed + + ...containing the same particles, but cruder and lesse digested, + from a cruder matter, by lesse perfect Organs, is left more + terrene, furnished with more material parts; which being united in + the womb, with the spiritual particles of the masculine seed; + everyone being rightly, according to his proper place, disposed and + ordered with the other; fixes and conjoynes those spiritual Atomes, + that they still afterwards remain in that posture they are placed + in.[18] + + +The theories of development promulgated by Digby and Highmore reveal the +chief formulations of mechanistic rationalism, more or less free of +empiricism, that were emerging as the vitalism of the sixteenth and +seventeenth centuries waned. There was little new in these theories: +both Digby's and Highmore's theories included different combinations of +elements of ancient lineage. Digby's concept was essentially free of +vitalistic coloring; akin to the embryological efforts of Descartes in +its virtual independence from observations of the developing embryo, it +was similarly vulnerable to Voltaire's criticism of Descartes, that he +sought to interpret, rather than study, Nature. This criticism is not so +applicable to Highmore, whose theory of development is more vitalistic +than Digby's, and is more akin to the concepts developed by Gassendi +than those of Descartes. Highmore had experience with the embryo itself, +and his actual contribution as an observer of development, although +hardly epochal, is worthy of note. But despite this empirical base, +Highmore has final recourse to a hypothesis blending many ancient ideas +and substituting the Aristotelian material and efficient causes for the +"fortune and chance" he objected to in Digby's hypothesis. It was _not_ +easy in the seventeenth century to avoid falling back upon some variety +of cause or force. + +In 1651, about two months before publication of Highmore's _History of +Generation_, a work appeared which marks another period in +seventeenth-century English embryology. William Harvey, _De Motu Cordis_ +almost a quarter of a century behind him, now published _De Generatione +Animalium_, the work he said was calculated "to throw still greater +light upon natural philosophy."[19] This book is, perhaps, not as well +known as Harvey's treatise demonstrating circulation of the blood, but +it is an important work in the history of embryology and it occupies a +prominent position in the body of English embryological literature. + +In _De Generatione_, Harvey provides a thorough and quite accurate +account of the development of the chick embryo, which, in particular, +clarified that the chalazae, those twisted skeins of albumen at either +end of the yolk, were not, as generally believed, the developing embryo, +and he demonstrated that the cicatricula (blastoderm) was the point of +origin of the embryo. The famous frontispiece of the treatise shows Zeus +holding an egg, from which issue animals of various kinds. On the egg is +written _Ex ovo omnia_, a legend since transmuted to the epigram _Omne +vivum ex ovo_. The legend illustrates Harvey's principal theme, repeated +constantly throughout the text, "that all animals were in some sort +produced from eggs."[20] + +If Harvey made no contribution beyond emphasizing the origin of animals +from eggs, he would deserve a prominent place in the history of +embryology. But the work is also significant in its espousal of +epigenesis, and, supported as his argument was by observation and logic, +it became the prime formulation of that concept of development during +the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. His statement of epigenetic +development is clear: + + In the egg ... there is no distinct part or prepared matter + present, from which the fetus is formed ... an animal which is + created by epigenesis attracts, prepares, elaborates, and makes use + of the material, all at the same time; the processes of formation + and growth are simultaneous ... all its parts are not fashioned + simultaneously, but emerge in their due succession and order ... + Those parts, I say, are not made similar by any successive union of + dissimilar and heterogeneous elements, but spring out of a similar + material through the process of generation, have their different + elements assigned to them by the same process, and are made + dissimilar ... all its parts are formed, nourished, and augmented + out of the same material.[21] + +Actually, Harvey's exposition of epigenesis, albeit clear, is not +totally impressive, since it is largely a reflection of Aristotle's +influence. The main importance of Harvey's vigorous and cogent defense +of epigenesis is that it provided some kind of counterbalance to the +increasingly dominant preformationist interpretations of embryonic +development. + +Harvey did not break with Aristotelianism; on the contrary, he lent +considerable authority to it. Unable to escape the past, he was not +completely objective in his study of generation. Everywhere the pages of +his book reveal his indebtedness to past authorities. Robert Willis, who +provided the 1847 translation of _De Generatione_, expresses this well: + + [Harvey] ... begins by putting himself in some sort of harness of + Aristotle, and taking the bit of Fabricius between his teeth; and + then, either assuming the ideas of the former as premises, or those + of the latter as topics of discussion or dissent, he labours on + endeavouring to find Nature in harmony with the Stagyrite, or at + variance with the professor of Padua--for, in spite of many + expressions of respect and deference for his old master, Harvey + evidently delights to find Fabricius in the wrong. Finally, so + possessed is he by scholastic ideas, that he winds up some of his + opinions upon animal reproduction by presenting them in the shape + of logical syllogisms.[22] + + +Even Harvey's concept of the egg reveals a strong Aristotelian bias. +Actually, Harvey attained to his conclusion that all animals derive from +eggs by assuming that + + on the same grounds, and in the same manner and order in which a + chick is engendered and developed from an egg, is the embryo of + viviparous animals engendered from a pre-existing conception. + Generation in both is one and identical in kind: the origin of + either is from an egg, or at least something that by analogy is + held to be so. An egg is, as already said, a conception exposed + beyond the body of the parent, whence the embryo is produced; a + conception is an egg remaining within the body of the parent until + the foetus has acquired the requisite perfection; in everything + else they agree; they are both alike primordially vegetables, + potentially they are animals.[23] + +The ovum, for Harvey, is in essence "the primordium vegetable or +vegetative incipience, understanding by this a certain corporeal +something having life in potentia; or a certain something existing _per +se_, which is capable of changing into a vegetative form under the +agency of an internal principle."[24] The ovum is for Harvey more a +concept than an observed fact, and, as stated by one student of +generation, "The _dictum ex ovo omnia_, whilst substantially true in the +modern sense, is neither true nor false as employed by Harvey, since to +him it has no definite or even intelligible meaning."[25] + +Harvey's treatise on generation is clearly a product of his time. It +advances embryology by its demonstration of certain facts of +development, by its aggressive espousal of epigenesis and the origin of +all animals from eggs, and by its dynamic approach stressing the +temporal factors in development and the initial independent function of +embryonic organs. However, the strong Aristotelian cast of Harvey's +treatise encouraged continued discussion of long outdated questions in +an outdated manner and, combined with his expressed disdain for +"chymistry" and atomism, discouraged close cooperation between +embryologists of different persuasions. It is perhaps easy to +underestimate the impact and general importance of Harvey's work in view +of these qualifications, and so it should be remarked that both positive +and negative features of _De Generatione_ influenced profoundly +subsequent embryological thought. + +It will be recalled that the title of _The Philosophicall Touch-Stone_ +identified Digby as the object of Alexander Ross's ire. In comparable +manner, the latter's _Arcana Microcosmi_, published in 1652, declares +its purpose to be "a refutation of Dr. Brown's Vulgar Errors, the Lord +Bacon's Natural History, and Dr. Harvy's book _De Generatione_." Let us +pause a brief moment in memory of a man so intrepid as to undertake the +refutation of three of England's great intellects in one small volume, +and then proceed to examine the embryological concepts of one of the +trio, Sir Thomas Browne. + +Browne's _Religio Medici_, composed as a private confession of faith +around 1635, is known to all students of English literature, as is his +later, splendid work on death and immortality, _Hydrotaphia, +Urne-Buriall_. One of the greatest stylists of English prose, Browne was +also a physician and a student of generation who deserves our attention +as an early chemical embryologist pointing the way to a form of +embryological investigation prominent in the last half of the +seventeenth century. + +Browne's embryological opinions are found particularly in _Pseudodoxia +Epidemica_, _The Garden of Cyrus_, and in his unpublished _Miscellaneous +Writings_. Browne, a well-read man, was educated at Oxford, Montpellier, +Padua, and Leyden, and he was thoroughly imbued with the teaching of the +prophets of the "new learning." This is evident throughout his writings, +as witness his admonition to the reader of the _Christian Morals_: + + Let thy Studies be free as thy Thoughts and Contemplations, but fly + not only upon the wings of Imagination; Joyn Sense unto Reason, and + Experiment unto Speculation, and so give life unto Embryon Truths, + and Verities yet in their Chaos.[26] + + +Browne greatly admired Harvey's work on generation, considering it "that +excellent discourse ... So strongly erected upon the two great pillars +of truth, experience and solid reason."[27] Browne carried out a variety +of studies upon animals of all kinds, in them joining Sense unto Reason, +and "Experiment unto Speculation." Thus in his studies of generation, he +made observations and also performed certain simple chemical +experiments. Noting that "Naturall bodyes doe variously discover +themselves by congelation,"[28] Browne studied experimentally the +chemical properties of those substances providing the raw material of +development. He observed the effects of such agents as heat and cold, +oil, vinegar, and saltpeter upon eggs of various animals, recording such +facts as the following: + + Of milk the whayish part, in eggs wee observe the white, will + totally freez, the yelk with the same degree of cold growe thick & + clammy like gumme of trees; butt the sperme or tredde hold its + former body, the white growing stiff that is nearest it.... Egges + seem to have their owne coagulum within themselves manifested in + the incrassations upon incubation.... Rotten egges will not bee + made hard by incubation or decoction, as being destitute of that + spiritt, or having the same vitiated.... How far the coagulating + principle operateth in generation is evident from eggs wch will + never incrassate without it. From the incrassation upon incubation + when heat diffuseth the coagulum, from the _chalaza_ or gallatine + wh. containeth 3 nodes, the head, heart, & liver.[29] + + +It cannot be said that Browne attained to any great generalizations +regarding embryogeny on the basis of his rather naive experiments, but +they are indicative of the effects of the "new learning" in one area of +biology. Actually, Browne appears more comfortable in the search for +patterns conforming to the quincunx, as in _The Garden of Cyrus_, and +although he may well have been in search of something like the later +Unity of Type, he uses his amassed details of scientific knowledge most +effectively in support of nonscientific propositions. Thus, he uses the +facts of embryonic development, alchemy, and insect metamorphosis as a +part of his argument for the immortality of the human soul: + + ...for we live, move, have a being, and are subject to the actions + of the elements, and the malice of diseases in that other world, + the truest Microcosme, the wombe of our mother; for besides that + generall and common existence wee are conceived to hold in our + Chaos, and whilst wee sleepe within the bosome of our causes, wee + enjoy a being and life in three distinct worlds, wherin we receive + most manifest graduations: In that obscure world and wombe of our + mother, our time is short, computed by the Moone, yet longer than + the dayes of many creatures that behold the Sunne; our selves being + yet not without life, sense, and reason; though for the + manifestation of its actions it awaits the opportunity of objects; + and seemes to live there but in its roote and soule of vegetation; + entring afterwards upon the scene of the world, wee arise up and + become another creature, performing the reasonable actions of man, + and obscurely manifesting that part of Divinity in us, but not in + complement and perfection, till we have once more cast our + secondine, that is, this slough of flesh, and are delivered into + the last world, that ineffable place of Paul, that proper _ubi_ of + spirits. The smattering I have [in the knowledge] of the + Philosophers stone ... hath taught me a great deale of Divinity, + and instructed my beliefe, how the immortall spirit and + incorruptible substance of my soule may lye obscure, and sleepe a + while within this house of flesh. Those strange and mysticall + transmigrations that I have observed in Silkewormes, turn'd my + Philosophy into Divinity. There is in those workes of nature, which + seeme to puzzle reason, something Divine, and [that] hath more in + it then the eye of a common spectator doth discover.[30] + +To affirm that Sir Thomas Browne was the founder of chemical embryology +or, indeed, to contend that he made a great impress upon the progress of +embryology is to humour our fancy. As Browne himself reminds us, "a good +cause needs not to be patron'd by a passion."[31] His work and +interpretations of generation are most important for our purposes as an +indication of the rising mood of the times and an emerging awareness of +the physiochemical analysis of biological systems. Although this mood +and awareness coexist in Browne's writings with a continued reverence +for some traditional attitudes, they mark a point of departure toward a +variety of embryological thought prominent in England during the second +half of the seventeenth century. + +Browne did no more than analyze crudely the reaction of the egg to +various physical and chemical agents. This static approach was later +supplanted by a more dynamic one concerned primarily with the +physicochemical aspects of embryonic development. This is first apparent +in a report by Robert Boyle in the _Philosophical Transactions of the +Royal Society_ in 1666 entitled, "A way of preserving birds taken out of +the egge, and other small foetus's." Boyle, unlike Browne, exposed +embryos of different ages to the action of "Spirit of Wine" or "Sal +Armoniack," demonstrating thereby the chemical fixation of embryos as an +aid to embryology. A year later, Walter Needham, a Cambridge physician +who studied at Oxford in the active School of Physiological Research, +which included such men as Christopher Wren and Thomas Willis, published +a book reporting the first chemical experiments upon the developing +mammalian embryo.[32] Needham's approach and goals are more dynamic than +those of Browne, and he attempts to analyze various embryonic fluids by +coagulation and distillation procedures. His experiments reveal, for +example, that "coagulations" effected by different acids vary according +to the fluid; thus, the addition of "alumina" to bovine amniotic fluid +produced a few, fine precipitations, whereas the allantoic fluid was +precipitated like urine. By such means Needham was able to demonstrate, +however crudely, that there are considerable differences in the various +fluids occurring within and around the fetus. Furthermore, it is with +the results of chemical analyses that he supports his other arguments, +such as his contention that the egg of elasmobranchs is not, as +believed, composed of only one humour, but has separate white and yolk. + +Needham's book contains many splendid observations, including an +accurate description of the placenta and its vessels, the relationship +of the various fetal membranes to the embryonic fluids, and rather +complete directions for dissection of various mammals. These need not +detain us, since the important aspect of Needham's work relevant to our +purpose is his continuation of the chemical analysis of the developing +embryo and its demonstration that, although Harvey might have despised +the "chymists" and been contemptuous of the "mechanical, corpuscular +philosophy," this system and approach was not to be denied. + +Needham's book is dedicated to Robert Boyle, whose _Sceptical Chymist_ +set the cadence for subsequent research based upon the "mechanical or +corpuscularian" philosophy and quantitative procedures. It is +appropriate for us, then, to terminate our discussion with a +consideration of this current in English embryological thought. + +John Mayow was the first to realize that "nitro-aerial" vapour, or +oxygen, is essential to respiration of a living animal, and he was soon +led to inquire "how it happens that the foetus can live though +imprisoned in the straits of the womb and completely destitute of +air."[33] As a consequence of this interest, the third of his _Tractatus +Quinque medico-physici_, published in 1674, is devoted to the +respiration of the fetus _in utero_. He shows truly remarkable insight +when he concludes therein that + + It is very probable that the spermatic portions of the uterus and + its carunculae are naturally suited for separating aerial particles + from arterial blood. + + These observations premised, we maintain that the blood of the + embryo, conveyed by the umbilical arteries to the placenta or + uterine carunculae transports to the foetus not only nutritious + juice, but also a portion of the nitro-aerial particles: so that + the blood of the infant seems to be impregnated with nitro-aerial + particles by its circulation through the umbilical vessels in the + same manner as in the pulmonary vessels. Therefore, I think that + the placenta should no longer be called a uterine liver, but rather + a uterine lung.[34] + +Although Mayow's attempted analysis of respiration of the chick embryo +_in ovo_ is less than successful, his views on fetal respiration were +soon accepted by many, and his tract stands as a great contribution to +physiological embryology. + +The studies of such individuals as John Standard reporting the weight of +various parts of the hen's egg, e.g., the shell, the yolk, the white, +reveal the wing of embryological investigation that was increasingly +obsessed with quantification and the physicochemical analysis of the +embryo and its vital functions. In this they were following the +injunction of Boyle, who used the developing embryo as a vehicle in an +attack upon the idea that mixed bodies are compounded of three +principles, the obscurities of which operated to discourage +quantification: + + How will this hypothesis teach us, how a chick is formed in the + egg, or how the seminal principles of mint, pompions, and other + vegetables ... can fashion water into various plants, each of them + endowed with its peculiar and determinate shape, and with divers + specifick and discriminating qualities? How does this hypothesis + shew us, how much salt, how much sulphur, and how much mercury must + be taken to make a chick or a pompion? And if we know that, what + principle it is, that manages these ingredients, and contrives, for + instance, such liquors, as the white and yolk of an egg into such a + variety of textures, as is requisite to fashion the bones, veins, + arteries, nerves, tendons, feathers, blood, and other parts of a + chick? and not only to fashion each limb, but to connect them all + together, after that manner, that is most congruous to the + perfection of the animal, which is to consist of them?[35] + + +The emphasis upon quantification and the physicochemical analysis of +vital processes was to continue into the eighteenth century and to +contribute to the great stress upon precision in that period. It was +not, however, destined to become immediately the main stream of +embryological investigation. For even as the studies of Mayow were in +progress, embryology was embarked upon a course leading to +preformationism. By the end of the seventeenth century, the idea that +the embryo was encased in miniature in either egg or sperm was elevated +to a position of Doctrine, and thereafter there was little encouragement +to quantitative study of development. Many embryological investigations +were performed during the eighteenth century, but most relate to the +controversy regarding epigenesis and preformationism as the true +expression of embryonic development. Withal, the seventeenth-century +embryologists, and particularly the embryologists of seventeenth-century +England, had contributed much to the progress of the discipline. They +had introduced new ideas, applied new techniques, and created new +knowledge; they had effectively advanced the study of development beyond +the stage of macro-iconography; they had freed the discipline from much +of its traditional baggage of causes, virtues, and faculties. Various +English embryologists had varying success with developmental theory, but +as a group they had made great impact upon the development of +embryology. In the course of their century, they had, in the words of +one of them, "called tradition unto experiment."[36] + + + + +_Notes_ + + +[1] Charles Dickens, _A Tale of Two Cities_, London, 1859, p. 1. + +[2] Kenelm Digby, _Private Memoirs of Sir Kenelm Digby, Gentleman of the +Bedchamber to King Charles the First_, London, 1827, Preface, p. i. + +[3] Kenelm Digby, _Two Treatises, in the One of Which, The Nature of +Bodies; in the Other, the Nature of Mans Soule; is Looked into_, Paris, +1644, p. 213. + +[4] _Ibid._, p. 220. + +[5] _Ibid._, pp. 220-221. + +[6] _Ibid._, p. 222. + +[7] _Ibid._, p. 215. + +[8] _Ibid._, p. 219. + +[9] _Ibid._, p. 213. + +[10] _Ibid._, pp. 217-219. + +[11] _Ibid._, p. 231. + +[12] Alexander Ross, _The Philosphicall Touch-Stone; or Observations +upon Sir Kenelm Digbie's Discourses of the nature of Bodies, and of the +reasonable Soule_, London, 1645. + +[13] Alexander Ross, _Arcana Microcosmi: or, The hid secrets of Man's +Body disclosed ... In an anatomical duel between Aristotle and Galen +concerning the parts thereof_, London, 1652, p. 87. + +[14] Nathaniel Highmore, _The History of Generation, Examining the +several Opinions of divers Authors, expecially that of Sir Kenelm Digby, +in his Discourse of Bodies_, London, 1651, p. 4. + +[15] _Ibid._, pp. 26-27. + +[16] _Ibid._, pp. 27-28. + +[17] _Ibid._, p. 45. + +[18] _Ibid._, Pp. 90-91. + +[19] William Harvey, _Opera omnia: a Collegio Medicorum Londinensi +edita_, Londini, 1766, p. 136. + +[20] William Harvey, _Anatomical Excercises on the Generation of +Animals_, trans. Robert Willis, London, 1847, p. 462. + +[21] _Ibid._, pp. 336-339. + +[22] _Works of William Harvey_, trans. Robert Willis, London, 1847, pp. +lxx-lxxi. + +[23] Harvey, _op. cit._, pp. 462-463. + +[24] _Ibid._, p. 457. + +[25] F. J. Cole, _Early Theories of Sexual Generation_, Oxford, 1930, p. +140. + +[26] Thomas Browne, _The Works_, ed. Geoffrey Keynes, Chicago, 1964, I, +261-262. + +[27] _Ibid._, II, 265. + +[28] _Ibid._, III, 442. + +[29] _Ibid._, III, 442-452. + +[30] _Ibid._, I, 50. + +[31] _Ibid._, I, 14. + +[32] Walter Needham, _Disquisitio anatomica de formato foetu_, London, +1667. + +[33] John Mayow, "De Respiratione foetus in utero et ovo," in _Tractatus +Quinque Medico-Physici_, Oxonii, 1674, p. 311. + +[34] _Ibid._, pp. 319-320. + +[35] Robert Boyle, _The Works_, London, 1772, I, 548-549. + +[36] Browne, _op. cit._, II, 261. + + + + +II + +_Robert Boyle as an Amateur Physician_ + +LESTER S. KING + + + +Robert Boyle was not a physician. To be sure, he had engaged in some +casual anatomical studies,[37] but he had not formally studied medicine +and did not have a medical degree. Nevertheless, he engaged in what we +would call medical practice as well as medical research and exerted a +strong influence on the course of medicine during the latter seventeenth +century, an influence prolonged well into the eighteenth. He lived +during the period of exciting yet painful transition when medical theory +and practice were undergoing a complete transformation towards what we +may call the "early modern" form. The transition, naturally gradual, +extended over three centuries, but I wish to examine only a very small +fragment of this period, namely, the third quarter of the seventeenth +century. + +Boyle's first major work which dealt extensively with medical problems +was the _Usefulness of Experimental Philosophy_. This work, although +published in 1663, had been written in two parts, the first much earlier +than the second. Fulton[38] indicates it had been drafted around 1650, +while Hall[39] ascribes it to the period 1647-1648. This first part has +relatively little to do with medicine; the references are few and rather +incidental, and have significance only for the light they throw on +"natural philosophy" and "natural religion." The second part, however, +written apparently not too long before publication, has a great deal to +do with medicine and constitutes one of the important medical documents +of the century. + +Deserving of mention is an earlier and minor work of Boyle, indeed, his +first published writing, only recently identified. This work, apparently +written in 1649, bore the title "An Invitation to a free and generous +communication of Secrets and Receits in Physick," and appeared +anonymously in 1655 as part of a volume entitled _Chymical, Medicinal +and Chirurgical Addresses Made to Samuel Hartlib, Esquire_.[40] For our +purposes, it is significant as emphasizing his early interest in +medicine. + +Boyle seems to have acquired most of his medical knowledge between, say, +1649 and 1662. It is worth recalling some of the trends and conflicts +that formed the medical environment during this period. Among the major +trends, first place, perhaps, must be given to Galenic doctrine, which +had come under progressively severe attack. Molière, who lived from 1622 +to 1673, showed in his comedies the popular reaction to a system which, +although dominant, was clearly crumbling. The cracks in the edifice even +the layman could readily see. Nevertheless, Galenism had its strong +supporters. Riverius, who lived from 1589 to 1655, was a staunch +Galenist. An edition of his basic and clinical works[41] was translated +into English in 1657, and Latin editions continued to be published well +into the eighteenth century.[42] + +Galenism, of course, had to withstand the great new discoveries in +anatomy and physiology made by Vesalius, Aselli, Sanctonius, Harvey, and +others, not to mention the host of great investigators who were more +strictly contemporaries of Boyle. + +Galenism also faced the rivalry of chemistry. The so-called "antimony +war" in the earlier part of the century marked an important assault on +Galenism, and the letters of the arch-conservative Guy Patin (who died +in 1672) help us appreciate this period.[43] However, even more +important was the work of van Helmont, who developed and extended the +doctrines of Paracelsus and represented a major force in +seventeenth-century thought. Boyle was well acquainted with the +writings of van Helmont, who, although his works fell into disrepute as +the mechanical philosophy gradually took over, nevertheless in the +middle of the seventeenth century was a highly significant figure. In +1662 there appeared the English translation of his _Oriatrike_,[44] +while Latin editions continued to be published later in the century. + +In this connection I might also mention the subject of "natural magic," +which had considerable significance for medicine. The best-known name +is, perhaps, Giovanni Battista della Porta (1545-1615), whose books[45] +continued to be published, in Latin and English, during this period when +Boyle was achieving maturity. + +Profound developments, of course, arose from the new mechanics and +physics and their metaphysical background, for which I need only mention +the names of Descartes, who died in 1650, and Gassendi, who died in +1655. And then there was also the new methodological approach, that +critical empiricism whose most vocal exponent was Francis Bacon, which +led directly to the founding of the Royal Society in 1660 and its +subsequent incorporation. These phases of seventeenth-century thought +and activity I do not intend to take up. + +In this turbulent riptide of intellectual currents, Robert Boyle, +without formal medical education, performed many medical functions, as a +sometime practitioner, consultant, and researcher. Repeatedly he speaks +of the patients whom he treated, and repeatedly he refers to +practitioners who consulted him, or to whom he gave advice. In addition, +through his interest in chemistry, he became an important experimental +as well as clinical pharmacologist, and his researches in physiology +indicate great stature in this field. If we were to draw a present-day +comparison, we might point to investigators who had both the M.D. and +the Ph.D. degrees, who had both clinical and laboratory training, and +who practiced medicine partly in the clinical wards, partly in the +experimental laboratories. Boyle, of course, did not have either degree, +but he did have a status as the leading virtuoso of his day. + +The virtuoso has been the subject of a most extensive literature.[46] He +aroused considerable contemporary hostility and satire and his overall +significance for medical science is probably slight, with a few striking +exceptions. Robert Boyle is one of the great exceptions. + +First of all, the virtuoso was an amateur. In the literal sense the +amateur loves the activities in which he engages, and in the figurative +sense he remains independent of any Establishment. Not trained in any +rigorous, prescribed discipline, he was not committed to any set +doctrine. Furthermore, he was not restricted by the regulations which +all Establishments employed to preserve their status, block opposition, +and prevent competition. In many fields the Establishment took the form +of a guild organization--in medicine, the Royal College of +Physicians.[47] + +Boyle was a wealthy and highly talented man who could pursue his own +bent without needing to make concessions merely to earn a living. He +remained quite independent of the cares which oppressed those less well +endowed in worldly goods or native talent. Sometimes, of course, +necessity can impose a discipline and rigor which ultimately may serve +as a disguised benefit, but in the seventeenth century, when Boyle was +active, the lack of systematic training and rigorous background seemed +actually an advantage. Clinical chemistry and the broad areas which we +can call experimental medicine had no tradition. Work in clinical +chemistry, clinical pharmacology, and experimental physiology was +essentially innovation. And since innovations are often made by those +who are outside the Establishment and not bound by tradition, we need +feel no surprise that the experimental approach could make great +progress under the aegis of amateurs. Necessarily the work was rather +unsystematic and undisciplined, but system and discipline could arise +only when the new approach had already achieved some measure of success. +Through the casual approach of amateurs this necessary foundation could +be built. + +Boyle, as a clinician, remained on excellent terms with medical +practitioners. For one thing, he took great care not to compete with +them. As stated,[48] he "was careful to decline the occasions of +entrenching upon their profession." Physicians would consult him freely. +As a chemist and experimental pharmacologist, he prepared various +remedies. Some of these he tried out on patients himself, others he gave +to practitioners who might use them. Boyle seems to have abundantly +provided what we today call "curbstone consultations." + +In no way bound by guild rules and conventions or by rigid educational +standards, Boyle was free to learn from whatever sources appealed to +him. Repeatedly he emphasized the importance of learning from +experience, both his own and that of others, and by "others" he included +not only physicians and learned gentlemen, but even the meanest of +society, provided they had experience in treating disease. This +experience need not be restricted to treatment of humans but should +include animals as well. Thus, in speaking of even the "skilfullest +physicians," he indicated that many of them "might, without +disparagement to their profession, do it an useful piece of service, if +they would be pleased to collect and digest all the approved experiments +and practices of the farriers, graziers, butchers, and the like, which +the ancients did not despise...; and ... which might serve to +illustrate the _methodus medendi_."[49] He was quite critical of +physicians who were too conservative even to examine the claims of the +nonprofessionals, especially those who were relatively low in the social +or intellectual scale. This casts an interesting sidelight on the +snobbishness of the medical profession. + +Boyle's willingness and ability to ignore the restrictions of an +Establishment represent the full flowering of what I might call the +Renaissance spirit--the drive to go outside accepted bounds, to +explore, to _try_, to avoid commitment, and to investigate for oneself. + +What internal and external factors permit a successful breakaway from +tradition? Rebels there have always been, yet successful rebels are +relatively infrequent. The late seventeenth century was a period of +successful rebellion, and the virtuosi were one of the factors which +contributed to the success. Robert Boyle played a significant part in +introducing new methods into science and new science into medicine. + +We must realize that Boyle was primarily a chemist and not a biologist. +He thought in chemical terms, drawing his examples from physics and +chemistry; he did not think in terms of the living creature or the +organism, and as a mechanist he passed quite lightly over the concept or +organismic behavior. His basic anti-Aristotelianism prevented his +appreciating the biologically oriented thought of Aristotle. Instead, +Boyle talked about the inorganic world, of water, of metals and +elements, of physical properties. He ignored that inner drive which +Spinoza called the _conatus_; or the _seeds_ of Paracelsus or van +Helmont; or the persistence over a time course of any "essence" or +"form." Since he dealt with phenomena relatively simple when compared +with living phenomena, he could, for this very reason, make progress, up +to a point. As a chemist, he could seek fairly specific and precise +correlations of various concrete environmental factors, and then assume +that living beings behaved as did the inorganic objects which he +investigated. However, he always excepted the soul of man, as outside +his investigations. + +But while Boyle was a skillful chemist, judged by the standards of his +time, we cannot call him a skillful medical investigator. This +represents, however, the fault of the era in which he lived rather than +any fault peculiar to him. Boyle's medical studies fall into at least +two categories. These were the purely physiological experiments, such as +those on respiration or on blood, and the more clinical experiments, +concerned with pharmaceuticals, clinical pharmacology, and clinical +medicine. The purely physiological experiments have great merit and were +profoundly influential in shaping modern physiology. The clinical +experiments throw great light on the development of critical judgment in +medical history, and the relations of judgment and faith. + +In 1775, John Hunter wrote a letter to Jenner that has become quite +famous. Hunter had just thanked Jenner for an "experiment on the +hedgehog." But, continued Hunter, "Why do you ask me a question by way +of solving it? I think your solution is just, but why think? Why not try +the experiment?"[50] The word "just," of course, in its +eighteenth-century sense, means exact or proper, precise or correct. A +"just solution" is one that is logically correct. The "think" refers to +Hunter's own uncertainty. He is not content with a verbal or logical +solution to a problem, he wants empirical demonstration. Why, he is +asking, should we be content with merely a logically correct solution +when we can have an experiential demonstration. _Try the experiment._ +Put the logical inference to the test of experience. + +This empirical attitude, not at all infrequent in the latter +eighteenth-century medicine, was quite unusual in the seventeenth-century +medicine. This was precisely the attitude that Robert Boyle exhibited in +his clinical contacts. + +Medicine, at least textbook medicine, was rationalistic. Textbooks +started with definitions and assertions regarding the fundamentals of +health. This we see particularly in a Galenic writer such as Riverius. +Medicine, he said, "stands upon the basis of its own principles, axioms +and demonstrations, repeated by the demonstration of nature."[51] In his +text, Riverius first expounded a groundwork concerning the elements, +temperaments and humors, spirits and innate heat, the faculties and +functions; then the nature of the diseases which resulted from +disturbances of these; and finally the signs of disease and the +treatment that was appropriate. All were beautifully interdigitated in a +logical fashion, and for any recommended therapy a good reason could be +found. There was, however, a serious difficulty. If anyone were so bold +as to ask, _But how do you know?_ only a rather lame answer would come +forth. The exposition rested in large part on authority or else largely +on reasoning from accepted premises--a "just" reasoning. And while much +keen observation was duly recorded and a considerable mass of fact +underlay the theoretical superstructure, the idea of empirical proof was +not current. Riverius chopped logic vigorously and drew conclusions from +unsupported assertions in a way that strikes us as reckless. + +For a body of knowledge to be a science, it must indicate a logical +connection between first principles, which were "universal," and the +particular case. The well-educated physician could always give a logical +reason for what he did. The empiric, however, was one who carried out +his remedies or procedures without being able to tell _why_. That is, he +could not trace out the logical connection between first principles and +the particular case. + +Galenism suffered especially from logical systematization, and the +system of van Helmont, while far less orderly, also had its own basic +principles on which all else depended. Boyle, however, practiced +medicine on a thoroughly different basis. He did not depend on system or +logic. In the words that Hunter used to Jenner over a hundred years +later, other physicians would _think_ the answers to their problems. +Boyle, however, preferred to _try the experiment_. He wanted _facts_. + +But this attitude, which sounds so modern, so praiseworthy and +enlightened, had one serious flaw. What _was_ a fact? And how did you +know? This important problem, so significant for the growth of +scientific medicine, we can study quite readily in the works of Robert +Boyle. + +The problem, in a sense, resolves around the notion of credulity. What +shall we believe? Boyle makes some distinctions between what he has seen +with his own eyes and what other people report to have seen. Thus, he +mentions "a very experienced and sober gentleman, who is much talked of" +who cured cancer of the female breast "by the outward application of an +indolent powder, some of which he also gave me." But, he adds +cautiously, he has not yet "had the opportunity to make trial of +it."[52] Clearly, since he cannot make the trial himself, Boyle +withholds judgment, even though the material came from a "very +experienced" gentleman. Or again, he talks about "sober travelers" who +made certain claims regarding the treatment of poisons. But, he says, +"having not yet made any trial of this my self, I dare not build upon +it."[53] + +There are numerous such instances, scattered throughout his works, where +he reports an alleged cure but specifically indicates his own mental +reservations. Clearly, he is quite cautious in accepting the statements +of others, even though they were "sober" or "experienced" or even +"judicious." On the other hand, he is extremely uncritical when he +himself uses the term "cure" and when he attributes cures to particular +medicines. + +His skepticism he indicates in references, for example, to Paracelsus +and van Helmont. Their specific remedy against "the stone," he says, and +their claims that they can reduce stones to "insipid water, is so +strange (not to say incredible) that their followers must pardon me, if +I be not forward to believe such unlikely things, til sufficient +experience hath convinced me of their truth."[54] Here, of course, we +see further a feature of critical acumen. A claim is made, but if this +claim runs counter to Boyle's own accepted body of knowledge, or to +logical doctrines derived from other directions, mere assertion cannot +carry conviction. "Sufficient experience" must play its part, and just +what constitutes "sufficient" we are not quite sure. + +In judging the effectiveness of a remedy or the credibility of a +statement, one of the most important weapons was _analogy_. Direct +observation of a phenomenon was good. Next best was direct observation +of some _analogous_ phenomenon whereby one body acted upon another to +alter its properties or induce significant changes. Boyle drew his +analogies largely from chemistry, but he had no hesitation in applying +them to medicine. + +Claims that medicines swallowed by mouth could dissolve stones in the +bladder seemed a priori unlikely. Yet there was considerable authority +that this took place; many persons had reported that this was a _fact_. +Boyle kept an open mind. He might be highly skeptical in regard to the +claims for any particular medication, but he did not deny the principle +involved. The possibility that some fluid, when swallowed, could have a +particular specific action on stones in the bladder, without affecting +the rest of the body, he considered quite plausible through the analogy +that quicksilver has an affinity with gold but has no effect upon iron. +Furthermore, a substance than can corrode a solid body may nevertheless +be unable to "fret" a different body which is considerably softer and +thinner, if the "texture" does not admit the small particles.[55] +Reasoning by analogy served to explain the logical plausibility. In +other words, he was very open-minded. He refused to dismiss all such +claims, and provided analogy as a reason for keeping his mind open; yet +he refused to accept particular claims of medicine that dissolved +stones, because the evidence was not convincing. We could scarcely ask +for more. + +An important seventeenth-century medical document was the report of Sir +Kenelm Digby, regarding the so-called "weapon salve." The essay +describing this famous powder was written in 1657, and I have discussed +it at some length elsewhere.[56] Here again Boyle keeps an open mind, +saying, "and if there be any truth in what hath been affirmed to me by +several eye-witnesses, as well physicians as others, concerning the +_weapon-salve_, and _powder of sympathy_, we may well conclude, that +nature may perform divers cures, for which the help of chirurgery is +wont to be implored, with much less pain to the patient, than the +chirurgeon is wont to put him to."[57] + +One great advantage of chemistry, thought Boyle, lay in the help it +provided in investigating the _materia medica_. Chemistry, he thought, +could help to purify many of the inorganic medicines and make them +safer, without impairing their medicinal properties. Furthermore, +chemistry could help investigate various medications customarily +employed in medicine, where "there hath not yet been sufficient proof +given of their having any medical virtues at all."[58] Boyle believed +that by proper chemical analysis he could isolate active components, or, +contrariwise, by failing to extract any valuable component, he could +eliminate that medicine from use. While a major interest, perhaps, was a +desire to provide inexpensive medicines, he was well aware that much of +what went into prescriptions probably had no value. Furthermore, he felt +that his chemical analysis could indicate whether value and merit were +present or not. + +The same skepticism applies to remedies that, far from being expensive, +were common and yet rather disgusting. The use of feces and urine as +medication was widespread. The medical virtues of human urine represent, +he believed, a topic far too great to be considered in a brief compass. +But he declared that he knew an "ancient gentlewoman" suffering from +various "chronical distempers" who every morning drank her own urine, +"by the use of which she strangely recovered."[59] Boyle was quite +skeptical of the reports of others, which he had not had opportunity to +try himself. But in therapeutic trials that he himself had witnessed, he +seemed utterly convinced that the medication in question was responsible +for the cure and was quite content to accept the evidence of a single +case. + +He discussed the "efficacy" of millepedes, which he found to be "very +diuretical and aperitive." And he indicated, on the evidence of a single +patient whom he knew, that the millepedes had great medicinal value in +suffusions of the eyes.[60] + +Many remedies of this type, the so-called old wives' remedies, were +those of empirics. As mentioned previously, Boyle felt deeply concerned +because physicians tended to ignore the alleged remedies of those who +had not had formal training in medicine. He believed that great specific +virtue probably lurked in many of these remedies, and he maintained that +the chemists should investigate them without the prejudice that the +medical professions exhibited. As part of this view, he felt that +"simples" should be more carefully studied, because medicinal virtues +inhered in single substances and that complicated combinations were +unnecessary. + +We find innumerable examples scattered through Boyle's writings +regarding the relations between chemistry and medication, numerous +descriptions of cures, and skepticism regarding other alleged cures. As +an important example, I would indicate Boyle's discussion of one of van +Helmont's alleged cures.[61] + +Van Helmont described the remarkable cures brought about by a man +identified only by the name of Butler. Apart from van Helmont's +discussion, we can find no trace of him in medical annals, and van +Helmont's own account is extremely skimpy. There are no dates given, and +the only temporal clue is that Butler apparently knew King James--King +James I, naturally. Butler was an Irishman who suddenly came into world +view while in jail. A fellow prisoner was a Franciscan monk who had a +severe erysipelas of the arm. Butler took pity on him, and to cure him +took a very special stone which he had and dipped it briefly in a +spoonful of "almond milk." This he gave to the jailer, bidding him +convey a small quantity of it into the food of the monk. Almost +immediately thereafter, the monk, not aware of the medicine, noted an +extremely rapid improvement. + +Van Helmont related other cures. For example, a laundress who had a +"megrim" [migraine] for sixteen years was cured by partaking of some +olive oil, into a spoonful of which Butler dipped the stone. Other cures +for which van Helmont vouched included a man who was exceedingly fat; he +touched the stone every morning with the tip of his tongue and very +speedily lost weight. Van Helmont's own wife was cured of a marked +edema of the leg. Similarly, a servant maid who had had severe attacks +of erysipelas which were "badly cured," and the leg leaden colored and +swollen, was cured almost immediately. An abbess, whose arm had been +swollen for eighteen years, partly paralyzed, was also cured. Van +Helmont, however, indicates that he himself, when he thought he was +being poisoned by an enemy, did not secure any benefit from the use of +the stone. Later, however, it turned out that, because of the nature of +the illness, he should have touched the stone with his tongue, to take +its virtue internally, rather than merely anointing the skin with oil +into which the stone had been dipped. + +Van Helmont makes it very clear that this is not magic or sorcery; there +is no diabolic influence, no necromancy. He drew attention to the +overwhelming effects which might result from a cause which was so minute +that it could not be perceived by the senses. We cannot here go into the +theoretical background which underlay van Helmont's conceptions, but we +must mention at least briefly his idea of a basic mechanism. Van Helmont +considered the action to be that of a ferment, where an extremely minute +quantity can produce a tremendous effect. He gives the analogy of the +tooth of a mad dog, which, although any saliva has been carefully wiped +off, can nevertheless sometimes induce madness. The effect of the stone +seems to be comparable. Its power becomes manifest even in enormous +dilution and can multiply, for it can import its remedial virtue to a +vast quantity of oil. Moreover, the stone had a sort of universal power +against all diseases. Such a virtue could not be vegetable in its +nature, but was, he thought, connected with metals. He pointed to the +well-accepted medicinal virtues which inhered in gems. Metals also had +great medicinal potency. Antimony, lead, iron, mercury, were well known, +and of special importance was copper, the _Venus_ of the early chemists. + +The medicinal virtue which inhered in Butler's stone and in other +powerful fermental remedies, van Helmont designated as "drif," which he +said means, in the vernacular, virgin sand or earth. This virtue +requires a metallic body in which to inhere. The general concept is not +unfamiliar, of a virtue or power or ferment which was attached to a +material object, and it is this type of explanation which was so +preponderant in, for example, Porta's _Natural Magick_. Van Helmont +speaks of the "first being," which translates the Latin _Ens_, of Venus +or copper. Vitriol is the basic substance, and for purification of the +virtue we require a "sequestration of its Venus from the dregs of the +vitriol."[62] + +This was the background from which Boyle set about to secure a potent +remedy. Van Helmont had discussed his experiments whereby he tried to +create a medicine which would have the virtues of Butler's stone. Boyle +attempted to improve on van Helmont's technique. Copper--Venus--was the +basic metal, and Boyle started with vitriol or copper sulfate. He gave +fairly explicit directions for the preparation, including calcination, +boiling, drying, adding sal armoniack, subliming twice. The resulting +chemical represented a purified medicine which he prescribed in variable +dosage, from two or three grains, up to twenty or thirty at the maximum. +He declared it to be a "potent specifick for the rickets," since he, and +others to whom he had given it for use, had "cured" a hundred or more +children of that disease. The medicine he also prescribed in fevers and +headache, and he thought it "hath done wonders" in obstinate +suppressions of the menses. It also improved the appetite. It worked, he +declared, through the sweat and, to some extent, the urine.[63] It is +noteworthy that Boyle did not claim to have cured the same illnesses +than van Helmont reports as having been cured by Butler's stone. + +As another example, he gave directions for preparing essence of +hartshorn--prepared, literally, from the horn itself. The preparation, +strongly alkaline, he prescribed in small doses of eight to ten drops. +The medicine "resists malignity, putrefaction, and acid humours," for +it destroys the acidity. He used it "in fevers, coughs, pleurisies, +obstructions of the spleen, liver, or womb, and principally in +affections of the brain...."[64] + +While Boyle was a far more skillful chemist than van Helmont, he did not +have any greater diagnostic acumen. And clearly, from the standpoint of +scientific method, he lacked any sharp criterion of cure. Various +patients were ill with various diseases; he gave them one or another +preparation; the patients recovered. Controls there were none. Boyle, +with great enthusiasm, believed that through natural philosophy we would +eventually discover "the true causes and seats of diseases" and also +find out effective remedies which would quickly free the patient from +the disease.[65] But faith and enthusiasm did not compensate for the +_post hoc propter hoc_ attitude. + +According to Galenic concepts, if diseases are due to alterations of +humors either in their quality or in their proportions, then the +suitable remedy will restore the appropriate quality or proportion. In +Galenic doctrine, the disturbance of the humors should be perceptible, +and a sound Galenic remedy should work by perceptibly changing the +nature and proportion of the humors back to normal. However, side by +side with the Galenic medical doctrines, there were the other prevalent +doctrines, among which I can mention the idea of "specifics." I can +emphasize three features: the specific remedy was active against a +particular disease, in a quite specific fashion, in the same way that an +antidote acted against a specific poison; second, the effectiveness was +a matter of direct experience, based on empirical observation; and +third, the mode of action remained relatively obscure, but nevertheless +the medicines did not seem to behave as did the so-called "Galenicals." +Thus, whether they acted by "sympathy," or by a special hidden virtue, +or by a peculiar microcosmic energy, we cannot say. But the _fact_ +remains that many people asserted the specific effectiveness[66] of this +or that remedy against a specific disease--e.g., that snakeweed was an +effective cure for the bite of a serpent. + +Learned physicians, unfortunately, refused in large part to accept the +validity of these alleged cures. Their hesitancy rested not on +statistical evidence or on niceties of scientific method, but on the +grounds that the alleged mode of operation was quite unintelligible and +not at all in accord with accepted doctrine. + +Boyle, as a chemist, insisted on keeping an open mind in regard to +so-called specifics. He objected strongly to the argument that simply +because we cannot account for their mode of action, we should conclude +that they were not effective. In a passage of great importance, he +declared, "Why should we hastily conclude against the efficacy of +specificks, taken into the body, upon the bare account of their not +operating by any obvious quality, if they be recommended unto us upon +their own experience by sober and faithful persons?" Thus, his chain of +reasoning is, first of all, these remedies work, as attested by direct +experience; we are not able to explain why or how they work; we must +not, however, fly in the face of experience and deny their effectiveness +simply because of our inability to explain the workings. He gives the +example of a "leaven," which in minute amounts is able to "turn the +greatest lump of dow [dough] into leaven."[67] + +Boyle strongly supported the well-known quotation of Celsus, that the +important thing is not what causes the disease but what removes it. In +strong terms he criticized "many learned physicians" who rejected +specifics on the ground "that they cannot clearly conceive the distinct +manner of the specificks working; and think it utterly improbable, that +such a medicine, which must pass through digestions in the body, and be +whirled about with the mass of blood to all the parts, should, +neglecting the rest, shew it self friendly to the brain (for instance) +or the kidneys, and fall upon this or that juice or humour rather than +any other."[68] Boyle then went into considerable detail to show how +this can take place through the action of ferments, combined with a +theoretical exposition of atomistic philosophy, which we do not have +time to go into at present. He gave in great detail an exposition of how +these specifics _may_ operate, but did not in any way produce cogent +evidence that they do in fact operate in such fashion. + +As a physician, Boyle insisted on facts over theory. He was constantly +pleading for physicians to enlarge their experience, to try new +medicines, even though these were not based on traditional doctrine. +Where observed fact conflicts with theory, the fact cannot be ignored. +Credulity of physicians, he indicated, may do the world "more mischief" +than any other profession, but nevertheless he condemned those who would +try to "circumscribe, or confine the operations of nature, and not so +much as allow themselves or others to try, whether it be possible for +nature, excited and managed by art, to perform divers things, which they +never yet saw done, or work by divers ways, differing from any, which by +the common principles, that are taught in the schools, they are able to +give a satisfactory account of."[69] Surely, this is not a model of +elegant English style, but the message is clear. Boyle was emphasizing +the message taught earlier in the century by Francis Bacon, that we must +judge the theory by the fact, and not the facts by the theory. It is the +same philosophy that Hamlet expounded, that there are more things in +heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our philosophy. + +We see, thus, that Boyle had taken a mighty step toward modern +scientific medicine, but he covered only a small part of the total +distance. He insisted that we should accept facts, but he did not +realize the difficulties attendant on defining a fact and making it +credible. He indicated that when strange results are alleged, "these +need good proof to make a wary man believe so strange a thing,"[70] but +what constitutes proof was a problem which he was not able to wrestle +with and, indeed, a problem which he did not clearly perceive. + +I would emphasize that Boyle was in essence a man of great faith. He had +great faith in religion, and was a deeply religious man. He was a great +supporter of so-called "natural religion" and tried to reconcile the +doctrines of natural philosophy with those of traditional religion. +Westfall[71] has considered in detail the religious attitudes of late +seventeenth-century writers, Robert Boyle in particular. The "proofs" +alleged by the proponents of natural religion have, of course, little +cogency. As Westfall points out, they examined nature in order to find +what they already believed. + +Nevertheless, religious faith was only one part of the total faith which +Boyle exhibited. He had as much faith in the capabilities, the future +progress, and the promise of science as he did in traditional religion. +Throughout all his works we see great evidence of his religious piety. +But his faith in science, particularly as it affected medicine, we see +with utmost clarity in the essay "The Usefulness of Natural Philosophy." +He had great vision of the benefits that science would eventually bring +to the healing arts. Unlike many of his contemporaries, particularly +persons such as Glanvill or Spratt, he realized that many anatomical +discoveries, for example, were of little practical value, but he felt +that such discoveries would, "in process of time (when the _historia +facti_ shall be fully and indisputably made out, and the theories +thereby suggested clearly established) highly conduce to the improvement +of the therapeutical part of physick...."[72] And with extraordinary +perceptiveness he indicated the different ways in which he expected +progress to be made through the proper application of mechanical +philosophy. He was clear-sighted enough to realize that the discoveries +made hitherto were not of great practical value but that the future was +indeed bright, and he provided a remarkable blueprint of progress to +come. + +The measure of progress is, perhaps, the quantity of faith which moves +mankind. The study of Robert Boyle emphasizes some divisions among +mankind. Some are content to look backward, to be satisfied with the +achievements of the past, to rely on accepted systematization, doctrine, +and explanation. Others, while dissatisfied with the past, have no guide +to lead them anywhere. Still others, however, have a strong faith in the +new course which they are pursuing, a faith which can guide them over +great difficulties. Boyle was such a man of faith--a word which is +really synonymous with "attitude." He marked the transition between the +old and the new, and pointed up the difficulties which transition always +involves. + + + + +_Notes_ + + +[37] Thomas Birch, _The Life of the Honourable Robert Boyle_, in Robert +Boyle, _The Works of the Honourable Robert Boyle_, ed. Thomas Birch, +London; 1772, I, liv, reprinted Hildesheim, 1965, I, Introduction, +viii-ix; Marie Boas Hall, _Robert Boyle on Natural Philosophy: An Essay +with Selections from His Writings_, Bloomington, Indiana, 1965, p. 16. + +[38] John F. Fulton, _A Bibliography of the Honourable Robert Boyle_, +2nd ed., Oxford, 1961, p. 37. + +[39] Hall, _op. cit._, p. 47. + +[40] Margaret E. Rowbottom, "The Earliest Published Writing of Robert +Boyle," _Annals of Science_, VI (1950), 376-389; R. E. W. Maddison, "The +Earliest Published Writing of Robert Boyle," _Annals of Science_, XVII +(1961), 165-173. + +[41] Lazarus Riverius, _The Universal Body of Physick, in five books,... +Exactly translated into English by William Carr_, London, 1657. + +[42] Lazari Riverii, _Opera Medica Universa_, Geneva, 1727. + +[43] J.-H. Reveillé-Parise, ed., _Lettres de Gui Patin_, Paris, 1846. + +[44] Jean Baptiste van Helmont, _Oriatrike or Physick Refined ... +faithfully rendered into English by J. C._, London, 1662, and _Ortus +Medicinae_, Editio Quarta, Lugduni, 1667. + +[45] Giovanni Battista della Porta, _Natural Magick_, London, 1658, +reprinted New York, 1957, and _Magiae Naturalis Libri Viginti_, +Rothomagi, 1650. + +[46] Richard F. Jones, _Ancients and Moderns: A Study of the Rise of the +Scientific Movement in Seventeenth-Century England_, 2nd ed., St. Louis, +1961; Richard S. Westfall, _Science and Religion in Seventeenth-Century +England_, New Haven, 1958; Marjorie Hope Nicolson, _Pepys' Diary and the +New Science_, Charlottesville: The University Press of Virginia, 1965; +Walter E. Houghton, "The English Virtuoso in the Seventeenth Century," +_Journal of the History of Ideas_, III (1942), 51-73, 190-219; and +Dorothy Stimson, _Scientists and Amateurs: A History of the Royal +Society_, New York, 1948. See also, for an entertaining primary source, +Thomas Shadwell, _The Virtuoso_, ed., Marjorie Hope Nicolson and David +Stuart Rodes, London, 1966. + +[47] Sir George Clark, _A History of the Royal College of Physicians of +London_, Oxford, Volume I, 1964, Volume II, 1966. + +[48] Boyle, "Memoirs for the Natural History of Human Blood," _Works_, +IV, 637. + +[49] Boyle, "On the Usefulness of Natural Philosophy," _Works_, II, 169. + +[50] Stephen Paget, _John Hunter_, London, 1897, p. 126. + +[51] Riverius, _Opera_, trans. Lester S. King, p. 1. + +[52] Boyle, "Usefulness," pp. 74-75. See also pp. 115-116. + +[53] _Ibid._, p. 87. + +[54] _Ibid._, p. 97. + +[55] _Ibid._, p. 98. See also "Of the Reconcileableness of Specific +Medicines to the Corpuscular Philosophy," _Works_, V, 85-86. + +[56] Lester S. King, "The Road to Scientific Therapy: 'Signatures,' +'Sympathy,' and Controlled Experiment," _Journal of the American Medical +Association_, CXCVII (1966), 250-256. + +[57] Boyle, "Usefulness," p. 115. + +[58] _Ibid._, p. 127. + +[59] _Ibid._, p. 130. + +[60] _Ibid._, p. 131. + +[61] Van Helmont, "Butler," _Ortus Medicinae_, pp. 358-365, and +_Oriatrike_, pp. 585-596. See also Boyle, "Usefulness," p. 102. + +[62] Van Helmont, _Ortus_, p. 365; _Oriatrike_, p. 596. + +[63] Boyle, "Usefulness," pp. 135-136. + +[64] _Ibid._, p. 138. + +[65] _Ibid._, p. 144. + +[66] Boyle, "Reconcileableness of Specific Medicines," pp. 80-81. + +[67] Boyle, "Usefulness," p. 183. + +[68] _Ibid._, p. 190. + +[69] _Ibid._, p. 194. + +[70] _Ibid._, p. 195. + +[71] Westfall, _op. cit._ + +[72] Boyle, "Usefulness," pp. 163-164. + + + + +_Members of the Seminar_ + + L. R. C. Agnew + Theodore Alexander + M. Peter Amacher + Lawrence Badash + Stephen Dow Beckham + Charles S. Bodemer + Hilda Boheme + John G. Burke + Seymour L. Chapin + Jack H. Clark + William E. Conway + Louise Darling + Edna C. Davis + Dr. & Mrs. John Field + Waldo H. Furgason + Martha Gnudi + Doris Haglund + Karl Hufbauer + Samisa Jadon + Dieter Jetter + Roy Kidman + Irving J. King + Lester S. King + Leslie Koepplin + Elizabeth Lomax + Patrick McCloskey + Nancy McNeil + Edgar Mauer + David S. Maxwell + Robert Moes + C. D. O'Malley + Ynez O'Neill + Marilyn Paul + Ladislao Reti + Sally Rutherford + Edward Shapiro + Hans H. Simmer + Ingrid Simmer + John E. Smith + Joan Starkweather + Betsey Starr + John M. Steadman + Annette Terzian + Lelde Trapans + Richard F. Trucken + Frances Valadez + Virginia Weiser + Fred N. White + Maxine White + Virginia Wong + Jacob Zeitlin + + + + _William Andrews Clark + Memorial Library + Seminar Papers_ + + +_Editing Donne and Pope._ 1952. + + Problems in the Editing of Donne's Sermons, by George R. Potter. + + Editorial Problems in Eighteenth-Century Poetry, by John Butt. + +_Music and Literature in England in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth +Centuries._ 1953. + + Poetry and Music in the Seventeenth Century, by James E. Phillips. + + Some Aspects of Music and Literature in the Eighteenth Century, by + Bertrand H. Bronson. + +_Restoration and Augustan Prose._ 1956. + + Restoration Prose, by James R. Sutherland. + + The Ironic Tradition in Augustan Prose from Swift to Johnson, by Ian + Watt. + +_Anglo-American Cultural Relations in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth +Centuries._ 1958. + + The Puritans in Old and New England, by Leon Howard. + + William Byrd: Citizen of the Enlightenment, by Louis B. Wright. + +_The Beginnings of Autobiography in England_, by James M. Osborn. 1959. + +_Scientific Literature in Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century England._ +1961. + + English Medical Literature in the Sixteenth Century, by C. D. O'Malley. + + English Scientific Literature in the Seventeenth Century, by Rupert + Hall. + +_Francis Bacon's Intellectual Milieu._ A Paper delivered by Virgil K. + Whitaker at a meeting at the Clark Library, 18 November 1961, + celebrating the 400th anniversary of Bacon's birth. + +_Methods of Textual Editing_, by Vinton A. Dearing. 1962. + +_The Dolphin in History._ 1963. + + The History of the Dolphin, by Ashley Montagu. + + Modern Whales, Dolphins, and Porpoises, as Challenges to Our + Intelligence, by John C. Lilly. + +_Thomas Willis as a Physician_, by Kenneth Dewhurst. 1964. + +_History of Botany._ 1965. + + Herbals, Their History and Significance, by George H. M. Lawrence. + + A Plant Pathogen Views History, by Kenneth F. Baker. + +_Neo-Latin Poetry of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries._ 1965. + + Daniel Rogers: A Neo-Latin Link between the Pléiade and Sidney's + 'Areopagus,' by James E. Phillips. + + Milton as a Latin Poet, by Don Cameron Allen. + +_Milton and Clarendon: Papers on Seventeenth-Century English +Historiography._ 1965. + + Milton as Historian, by French R. Fogle. + + Clarendon and the Practice of History, by H. R. Trevor-Roper. + +_Some Aspects of Seventeenth Century English Printing with Special +Reference to Joseph Moxon_, by Carey S. Bliss. 1965. + +_Homage to Yeats, 1865-1965._ 1966. + + Yeats and the Abbey Theatre, by Walter Starkie. + + Women in Yeats's Poetry, by A. Norman Jeffares. + +_Alchemy and Chemistry in the Seventeenth Century._ 1966. + + Renaissance Chemistry and the Work of Robert Fludd, by Allen G. Debus. + + Some Nonexistent Chemists of the Seventeenth Century, by Robert P. + Multhauf. + +_The Uses of Irony._ 1966. + + Daniel Defoe, by Maximillian E. Novak. + + Jonathan Swift, by Herbert J. Davis. + +_Bibliography._ 1966. + + Bibliography and Restoration Drama, by Fredson Bowers. + + In Pursuit of American Fiction, by Lyle Wright. + +_Words to Music._ 1967. + + English Song and the Challenge of Italian Monody, by Vincent Duckles. + + Sound and Sense in Purcell's 'Single Songs,' by Franklin B. Zimmerman. + +_John Dryden._ 1967. + + Challenges to Dryden's Biographer, by Charles E. Ward. + + Challenges to Dryden's Editor, by H. T. Swedenberg. + +_Atoms, Blacksmiths, and Crystals._ 1967. + + The Texture of Matter as Viewed by Artisan, Philosopher, and Scientist + in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries, by Cyril Stanley Smith. + + Snowflakes and the Constitution of Crystalline Matter, + by John G. Burke. + +_Laplace as a Newtonian Scientist_, by Roger Hahn. 1967. + +_Modern Fine Printing._ 1967. + + The Private Press: Its Essence and Recrudescence, by H. Richard Archer. + + Tradition and Southern California Printers, by Ward Ritchie. + + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + + Passages in italics are indicated by _underscore_. + + Additional spacing after some of the quotes is intentional to indicate + both the end of a quotation and the beginning of a new paragraph as + presented in the original text. + + The following misprints have been corrected: + "acessible" corrected to "accessible" (page 10) + "Futhermore" corrected to "Furthermore" (page 10) + "histroy" corrected to "history" (page 14) + "wordly" corrected to "worldly" (page 32) + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Medical Investigation in Seventeenth +Century England, by Charles W. Bodemer and Lester S. 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